Before Bakhmut became famous internationally as a battleground, it was known inside Ukraine for salt, sparkling wine fermented in an old alabaster mine and roses that lined its streets. That physical town is gone now, its buildings in ruins, its streets a no man’s land of makeshift cemeteries laced with mines. Russian troops destroyed it as they claimed it, inch by inch, in a slow campaign between the summers of 2022 and 2023.
Ukrainian resistance turned this Donbas town into a byword for courage. The last few bottles rescued from the winery sell online for more than French vintages, their prices charged by nostalgia and patriotism.
